June glories.

There is something very special about winter in Adelaide. The garden is quiet and damp, and completely lovely in a scruffy kind of way. 

'Sophy's Rose' is my June stalwart. 

'Cramoisi superieur' putting on a surprise show. 

Hidden hollyhocks under the apricot tree. 

Terrible photo of Chocolate Cosmos and Pelargonium reniforme. 

Pelargonium sidoides, love love love this one. 

Salvia leucantha under the apricot. 

Alyssum 'Snow White'

Acacia iteaphylla goes nuts at this time of year (red-flowering Japanese quince behind)

Mini gerberas and blue lobelia in a pot. 

Dwarf calendula, my favourite buff yellow. 

Fairy pelargonium (forget species) with a saltbush I totally forget the name of (Maireana erioclada?)

Pineapple sage, birds love this one (lemon behind). 

Rosa 'Crepuscule' under our bedroom window. Can hardly wait until it's bigger!

Volunteer nasturtium (one of lots, no wonder it's a weed in these parts). 

Lastly, the new garden corner, most plants in except for the roses which should arrive soon. 

Nature strip update

It has been a whole entire year since I last posted anything about my nature strip project! Click here for a picture of what it looked like last time, and for a complete history try here. To refresh your memory (and mine), this council-owned strip of land is hot, windy, very dry, and the 'soil' is compacted clay and dolomite with a roughly neutral pH (despite the dolomite). Before I got my gardener's hands on it, it was a strip of bare gravel with two trees poking out it it (foreground larger tree is Eucalyptus leucoxylon ssp megalocarpa, the large fruited SA blue gum, and the smaller tree further back is probably a weedy malnourished version of the same).
Well, look at this spot now! Starting to come along well and filling out nicely.

 

When I started I just planted 'native plants,' but after the first round of planting (about three years ago) I've only planted indigenous species in here, and ones I hoped would be suitable (obviously... but I know more now and can choose better!) In this picture there are Poa labilliaderi (most of the grasses), Ficinia nodosa (knobby club rush, bottom right), Acacia myrtifolia (dead centre, still small), Enchalaena tomentosa (left by pole), and Goodenia amplexans (clasping goodenia, at left).

This photo is looking at the same patch from the other direction. At the front-left is a non-indigenous grevillea (name escapes me), at front right is a Myporum parvifolium. Barely visible because it blends in so well, behind the grevillea, is the saltbush Atriplex semibaccata, and behind that is all those mentioned before with a better view of the goodenia (now on the right).

This picture shows the other end of the nature strip. It's a bit more bare because that's where we need to put our waste bins on rubbish days. At the far left is the original Juncus ursitatus (not indigenous), behind that is an indigenous Juncus (sarophus?! C'mon, brain, work!), doing surprisingly well despite the harsh conditions. Also in this picture, but much less obvious, is more Myoporum, Enchaleana, and Ficinia, a couple of eremophilas (cultivars and not indigenous species), a bit of dianella which has been struggling along since the beginning, and a little Calytrix tetragona. And some weeds. Oh yes! I improved the soil and the weeds have certainly taken advantage. Most of them are little thistles and dandelions and easily dealt with. A couple of months ago I also removed the biggest weeds in here: several large clumps of gazanias. 'Oh,' said a neighbour, 'but they grow so well!' Yes, indeed! That's one reason they're a weed!

The one major difference I have found between planting native plants in the nature strip, as opposed to in my front garden (behind the fence) is that the plants are growing far more slowly. This would be from a combination of the difficult growing conditions, and receiving far less water over summer. I only toss a few buckets of water about there when it gets really hot.

 And last but not least, a winter-happy for you :) The indigenous Clematis microphylla growing on my front fence and flowering it's head off. Very pretty!

Stay warm xx

Purple and yellow and...?

It's nearly rose time. Nearly time to plant and nearly time to prune. I am a bit ahead of myself this year, because Babe #2 is due when all this should be happening so I'm quite keen to get things done before s/he arrives and I am pinned to the couch for the next six months.
I made myself a short-list of roses that I'm interested in (all climbers, this time). I couldn't help noticing that SP has annointed it with her own ideas... Is that a 'no' to Tess of the D'Ubervilles, or a 'yes,' I wonder?

I have three roses arriving soon: The long-lusted after Reine des Violettes for the front garden, a Strawberry Hill, also for the front garden, and a Munstead Wood for out the back. I used my usual buying strategy for these plants, which goes: Buy now, work out where to plant them later. 

Now, I have this section of front garden along the eastern fence, which looks endlessly crappy. The soil is particularly rubbish (sandy, water repellant, and dry dry dry), and the heat from the sun in the west over summer fries everything when it reflects off the fence. When we first bought our house I planted a banana passionfruit here. There's an old post here, when I was still optimistic it would work out! Anyway, the vine grew but never especially well. It never had a single flower, and obviously never any fruit! So, this week I pulled it out. Bang. Gone. Poor bugger, but them's the breaks.

(This shot is post-passionfruit removal, but before I'd done anything else)

 

I still want a garden bed along this fence and I have two main issues to address: the heat and the soil. For the heat - and I'm reeeeally hoping this works - I put beige-coloured shade-cloth along the fence, thinking that beige would be the least conspicuous. Then I stepped back and thought, 'Good Gods, that looks awful!' 

But, fortunately, looking at that section from further away it doesn't seem quite so bad, a bit shielded by the little ornamental plum tree (reddish brown tree) and the Acacia iteaphyllas on the neighbour's side of the fence (very pretty yellow shrub/small tree, terrible invasive weed in the Adelaide Hills, and many other regions of Australia...)

 

To help amend the soil I added several bags of neutral compost, most of a bag of cow manure and a few handfuls of Dynamic Lifter pellets. For good measure I found some worms in another area of the front garden and gave them a new home in here (a good indication of the poor nature of the soil: there were no worms at all!)

 

Then, to plants! Roses, obviously, where this disjointed post started. I want to put a small climbing rose at the bottom left of the photo, but which one, or what colour? That small shrub that I've left in place is a Myoporum batae, very pretty weeping plant which should make it to several meters tall (though I'll probably keep it smaller). Great plant for dodgy conditions. Next plant in line is a new Graham Thomas rose I couldn't resist getting from a Big Box hardware store. It's not strictly a climbing rose, but can get to over two meters tall and it's becoming one of my absolute favourites, see why? Man, I love that yellow...

(This is not my picture! I got it from here: http://placespill.blogspot.com.au/2013/05/graham-thomas.html)

 

Next in line will be my Reine des Violettes, which I'm hoping will end up looking like this:

(Again, not my picture, this image is from here: http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/rosesant/gal0508135015639.html )

And that is the end of that space. Underneath there is currently a ground covering Eremophila 'Augusta Storm,' which I left because it was growing well and an Atriplex semibaccata (two more good plants for dodgy dry and hot conditions). I found some red 'Mrs Bradshaw' geums - my latest plant obsession' so I popped one of those in as an experiment, since I have no idea how they grow.  It's not a big space, really, but I'd like the purple and yellow roses to contrast (along with the mystery #3 rose... suggest colours/varieties to me! I'm leaning towards a red/crimson, maybe a Blackboy rose?)